Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, January 28, 1994 TAG: 9401280120
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KAREN BARNES STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BEDFORD LENGTH: Medium
Bedford and Bedford County students and parents couldn't figure out whether school would be open Thursday, because a series of three announcements sent conflicting signals.
At 5 a.m., school was on, but delayed two hours. Buses were to run on snow routes.
By 9:30 a.m., school was scheduled to open at noon, but no buses would provide transportation. Parents could bring their children to school if they could navigate the roads.
Finally at 10:10 a.m., Superintendent John Kent officially called off school.
Students were left stranded at bus stops. Parents couldn't get answers. Some scrambled from home to day-care centers to work and back to day-care centers, dragging their children along. Television stations showed various messages.
Toni Key was angry. "I'd like to see the man fired," she said. "Everybody was confused. He does this all the time, but this takes the cake."
Last week, Key witnessed two bus accidents on Virginia 643 near her home. School was running on a normal schedule despite icy roads. Two buses slid on the ice; one careened into a ditch, and the other crashed into a fence.
No children were injured, and neither bus sustained major damage, officials said.
Key thinks Kent should have opened school two hours later last week and canceled it earlier on Thursday. "He's playing games with our children's safety, and he doesn't deserve to be up there," she said. "Every time there's inclement weather, he does this."
A school spokeswoman said Kent was taking a wait-and-see approach by calling for the two-hour delay Thursday morning. "He was trying to give an option, but it backfired," Amy Smith said. "He'll take full responsibility."
by CNB